Abraham's Faith and Abraham's Obedience

Caleb Howard takes a look at the faith and obedience of Abraham and considers how his faith-fuelled obedience impacts his relationships with others

Abraham was the man of faith (Galatians 3:9). The apostle Paul observed (Romans 4:3,10) that Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness (Genesis 15:6) before he obeyed God by being circumcised (Genesis 17:26).

But Abraham was also a man of obedience. The author of Hebrews says that Abraham obeyed God by faith (Hebrews 11:8). James tells us that when Abraham went to offer his son (Genesis 22), his ‘faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”’ (James 2:22-23).

There is no real contradiction here. The faith that these New Testament writers (and Abraham) loved produces obedience by its very nature, like an apple tree produces apples. When Abraham obeyed God in Genesis 17, the faith of Genesis 15:6 was bearing its natural fruit.

I am regularly amazed by how carefully the New Testament writers read the Old Testament. They knew this about faith and obedience because it was what Jesus taught them, but they knew it just as well because it was what Genesis taught them.

When Abraham (formerly Abram) was told by God to leave his family and go to a land that God would show him, he did it because he believed what God said. God not only commanded him to act (Genesis 12:1), but he made him promises (vv. 2-3) and Abraham took God at his word. He demonstrated that by going (v. 4), and he kept demonstrating it throughout his life.

The Bible does not shield us from the sin of its heroes. Every great Old Testament character is, in some respect, disappointing, and Abraham is no exception. This has the effect of making the reader wonder whether anyone will ever arise who will not disappoint. But the fact remains that, over the course of the Abraham story, we can see a trend of Abraham trusting God’s word and obeying. The culmination of this trend is the (almost) sacrifice of Isaac in Genesis 22, a fact which may be reflected in James 2:21-23. Abraham established a pattern of life for all of those who share in his faith.

Interspersed among those oft-quoted passages that reveal the nature of Abraham’s relationship with God—Genesis 12:1-3, Genesis 15, Genesis 17—are passages which reveal the nature of Abraham’s relationships with others. Abraham’s faith-fuelled obedience was worked out among them, so that they functioned as foils for him.

Consider Abraham and Lot, Abraham’s nephew. Both of them were rich and their flocks and herds became too much for the land, so there was a dispute (Genesis 13:2, 5-7). Lot was given the choice of where to go and he chose a well-watered region near the city of Sodom. The people of Sodom, the narrator tells us were, ‘wicked, great sinners against the LORD’ (13:13), and the narrative alludes to the coming destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (13:10). Having moved his tent near Sodom in 13:12, Lot was found to be living in Sodom in the next chapter (14:12). So hapless Lot was carried off by Chedorlaomer and his allies and had to be rescued (14:16).

When Abraham and Lot separated, Abraham remained in the hill country, pitching his tent in Hebron (13:18). Abraham formed a covenant with some Amorites (14:13), a problematic thing to do in Joshua’s time, but this was centuries earlier, and ‘the iniquity of the Amorites was not yet complete’ (15:16). In Abraham’s day, it was Sodom’s sin that had nearly run its course. When Lot’s association with Sodom led to him being taken captive along with his wealth, Abraham was the one who rescued him, and brought back all of the spoils of Sodom. The king of Sodom had apparently escaped the sword of Chedorlaomer, and he offered to allow Abraham to keep the riches of Sodom (14:21). But Abraham was clear: he wanted nothing to do with Sodom. Rather he aligned himself with an obscure priest-king, Melchizedek, king of (Jeru)Salem, priest of the LORD, God Most High (14:18-24).

It should be no surprise, then, to find, in the next episode, that Abraham ‘believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness’ (15:6). Abraham was the man of faith and that faith produced obedience. He wanted nothing to do with the wealth of those who had set themselves against the LORD. Instead, Abraham entered a formal covenant with the LORD (15:18) and sided with his priest-king. Sodom was but a step from total calamity. Lot had cosied up to it and he was carried along in its fate. There is a time to take sides in the life of faith and obedience, and the stakes are high.

The theme of righteousness resulting from faith continues throughout Abraham’s story. It is bound up with God’s promise of offspring in the face of barrenness. Abraham struggled along the path of faith-motivated obedience (Genesis 16) and God further defined the nature of their relationship (Genesis 17). Abraham was to walk before the LORD and be blameless (17:1), sealing the covenant with circumcision (17:9-10). And so that covenant would pass, not to Ishmael, but to Isaac, the yet unborn son of promise and the offspring of the barren woman (17:19,21).

It was at this pivotal moment that Abram’s name was changed to Abraham. Probably these are two forms of the same name, one with an h inserted (Abram > Abraham), a change that happens sometimes in Semitic languages. Both mean ‘father is exalted’, but one sounds more similar to ab-hamon, ‘father of a multitude’: ‘No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations’ (Genesis 17:5).

But the Sodom theme is not forgotten in the narrative: the time had come to judge it, and this event would form a backdrop for Abraham’s faithfulness. The LORD decided to reveal to Abraham what he was about to do to Sodom, because, God reasoned, Abraham was to become a great and mighty nation and all nations would be blessed through him (18:18). This is because God chose him, ‘that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice, so that the LORD may bring to Abraham what he has promised him’ (18:19).

Having been told by God that he was about to judge Sodom, Abraham asked a series of questions to do with the righteousness of God: ‘Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? . . . Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?’ (18:23,25). The answer was no, the LORD would not sweep away the righteous with the wicked; he would do what is just. In fact, if there were even ten righteous people in Sodom, the LORD would spare the whole city (18:32).

Indeed, the righteous God even went to the extent of confirming by two witnesses the wickedness of Sodom (19:1). When the angels arrived, they found that, in spite of having been nearly swept away with the riches of Sodom (14:11-12), Lot remained deeply embedded there. Lot, like Abraham, tried to be a good host (19:1-3; compare 18:1-8), though, arguably, his fare was more meagre. While the angels were guests in Lot’s house, the evil of the city infamously revealed itself (19:5). Lot made a horrible attempt at protecting his guests (19:7-8) and the angels intervened. Lot had to take his family and leave the city before it was destroyed.

Lot is a complex character. His cosying up to Sodom nearly ruined him (twice!) and his treatment of his daughters (19:8) bore some resemblance to Sodomite behaviour. But the fact remains that God, remembering Abraham, rescued Lot from overthrow (19:29). Against the backdrop of Abraham’s conversation with God about his righteousness in judging Sodom (18:17-33), we can infer that Lot was righteous, as Peter does in 2 Peter 2:7-8. This righteousness, like that of Abraham, must not be moral perfection, but faith reckoned as righteousness.

Nonetheless, we would do well not to miss the awful effects of Sodom, even on a person of Abrahamic faith. Lot’s treatment of his daughters came back to haunt him and they made him the father of incestuous sons (19:30-38): Moab (which sounds like ‘from father’ in Hebrew) and Ben-ammi (which can mean ‘son of my grandfather’). These boys were indeed sons of their (mothers’) father and sons of their grandfather.

So we have two contrasting and complex figures in the Abraham narratives. If we read the stories carefully, we will undoubtedly find ourselves disappointed by both in various ways, but one is particularly disappointing. Lot was righteous, but, as it were, by the skin of his teeth. His is a cautionary (historical) tale of the dangers of becoming comfortable with Sodom. He was twice rescued from the downfall of Sodom (14:16; 19:29) through the agency of a man more righteous than he. The narrative is at pains to show us the nature of Abraham’s righteousness, borne of faith. Indeed, when God assessed Abraham’s life after his death, he said that ‘Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws’ (26:5). But that claim must be grounded in the fact that Abraham ‘believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness’ (15:6).

This tension—faith producing righteousness which is nonetheless disappointing—carries through the Old Testament with character after character. Surely, we may reasonably think, there is more to righteousness than this. Will a character never appear whose righteousness never falters, someone who can make the Abrahamic pattern of faith producing faltering righteousness meaningful? Will not the Judge of all the earth do what is right? And it is precisely in this tension that the good news about Jesus brings resolution.